Fleeing Driver Calls Cops, Asks Them to Stop Pursuing Him

Usually, when you're in a high-speed chase with the police, you only have three options: pull over and surrender, outrun the police and escape, or crash and die. But what if there were a fourth option?

An unidentified young Utah man asked himself that same question—and, in the long tradition of American innovators, decided to think outside the box. What if, he wondered, I just... asked the police to stop chasing me?

The man, 20, was driving east on U.S. Highway 40 near Strawberry Reservoir when a deputy tried to stop him for going 15 miles over the speed limit, according to Wasatch County Chief Deputy Sheriff Jared Rigby. The driver did not stop and the deputy told dispatchers he was pursuing a fleeing driver.

A short time later, a dispatcher notified the deputy that the driver had called in and said "that he was not going to stop and that I needed to leave him alone," Rigby said, reading from the deputy's report.

The technique made sense—he wasn't trying to hide anything, he was just in a bad mood (over "problems with his girlfriend," natch), and why would you want to pull over for the cops if you're in a bad mood? But in the end, his new strategy didn't work so well—he eventually pulled over in front of tire spikes, ending the chase. Sigh. True innovators are never appreciated in their own eras.